33.
Just as in the body symptoms of latent ill-health precede the disease—there is, for example, a certain weak sluggishness, a lassitude which is not the result of any work, a trembling, and a shivering that pervades the limbs,—so the feeble spirit is shaken by its ills a long time before it is overcome by them.
It anticipates them, and totters before its time.
But what is greater madness than to be tortured by the future and not to save your strength for the actual suffering, but to invite and bring on wretchedness?
If you cannot be rid of it, you ought at least to postpone it.
Book: Moral Letters Vol II
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On virtue as a refuge from worldly distractions
Location: Chapter 74, Section 33
Content:
33.
Just as in the body symptoms of latent ill-health precede the disease—there is, for example, a certain weak sluggishness, a lassitude which is not the result of any work, a trembling, and a shivering that pervades the limbs,—so the feeble spirit is shaken by its ills a long time before it is overcome by them.
It anticipates them, and totters before its time.
But what is greater madness than to be tortured by the future and not to save your strength for the actual suffering, but to invite and bring on wretchedness?
If you cannot be rid of it, you ought at least to postpone it.